Clarissa - first 20 Letters...

...Or 5%. Although no-one on the Goodreads forum has commented yet, and I am kind of too shy to make the first move! I admit, this is not the easiest book to get into and you can't really read it quickly, but once you get into it, it seems to become easier and the archaic language makes a bit more sense.

Anyway, Clarissa is currently under a massive amount of pressure from her money-grabbing family to marry the odious Mr. Solmes, her only comfort being her clandestine letters to Miss Howe describing her treatment and the appalling way her siblings are behaving. Our heroine is trying to be as reasonable as possible, but to no avail. Mr. Solmes has cunningly promised either an exchange of estates with James (Clarissa's brother) or that he will buying the northern estate, increasing the family's land. Her mother has been roped into persuading her, and Clarissa hoped to bring her mother over to her way of thinking, but alas, as Clarissa tells her, she has the will of her father's relations rather than her mother. Her mother married for love, but she has very little will of her own, as she says herself, although her husband is a good man 'he will not be controuled [sic]; nor yet persuaded.' She lives in a state where she has to accede to his every whim. Surely, this is no recommendation to Clarissa to wed? She evidently wants to avoid her mother's example, as she puts it, 'those who will bear much, shall have much to bear', that through her passivity her mother is allowing her father's tyranny, and in extension, the unchecked, strong wills of her other children as well. Clarissa believes that as she is in the right to refuse Solmes, she is not being stubborn. She offers to either not marry at all (lamenting that as the family are not Catholic, she had no recourse to entering a nunnery), or only marry with her parent's consent. However, her pleas fall on deaf ears and there seems to be little she can do to improve her situation or avoid marrying Solmes. 

The reader really feels for her here in the way that her family seem to treat her as a bargaining chip rather than a person with feelings. She is completely disgusted with Solmes and finds his physical appearance and character repugnant. I guess some of the original people reading it would probably side with her parents though, and find it surprising that someone who is portrayed as being so obedient should be so against doing what her parents want. Her parents seem to believe that she is rejecting Solmes out of some sort of crush on Lovelace and that by forcing her into marriage quickly she will be out of the way of the man that James hates.